Stray night cat
by Naoki Ichigo
Summary: When Zhou Zekai and Jiang Botao took a stroll around the city, they hadn't expected to meet their senior, especially not in such a sad condition.


All Zhou Zekai and Jiang Botao wanted to do was to take a little stroll around their hometown. Actually, only Zhou Zekai wanted to take a little stroll around, but the vice-captain of team Samsara decided to was too dangerous for their captain to walk around on his own, especially since that guy barely said a word – how was he supposed to ask for help in case he needed it? So in the end both disguised themselves and went out. Luckily it was winter, thus it was already pitch black outside and wearing many layers was normal – hiding your face behind a scarf was normal. Disguising yourself was the easiest during winter – in the summer, the time when one actually wanted to go outside and enjoy the good weather, things were a billionth time harder. However, despite being lucky not to run into any fan or reporter, they made an encounter that was unforeseen and changed their plans drastically.  
After walking around aimlessly, Zhou Zekai decided that it was now the perfect time for ice cream. Jiang Botao didn't object, but couldn't understand, how someone was able to eat ice cream in winter, especially at night, when it was so much colder than during the day, but who was he to tell Zhou Zekai what he could do and what not? It was a good thing that the small ice café also severed warm dinks, so he drank his chocolate milk, while his captain enjoyed his ice. Afterwards, they wanted to go back to the club, yet halfway there Zhou Zekai changed his mind and wanted to go to the zoo – at night. Again, Jiang Botao did not object and silently followed after the other one, questioning the mantel state of his captain. Usually, Zekai didn't make any kind of requests or gave suggestions of activities – not because he was overly lazy, but because he was just too shy to voice his thoughts. Sometimes Botao could only tell what was going on by observing Zekai's mimic. For example, last summer the team wanted to make a little trip, however they couldn't agree on a destination for said trip so they ended up simply taking a tour through the city. At some point they passed by an ice café, one their captain wanted to go to. Instead of pointing out that he wanted to go there, he only shot it a longing glance once or twice, looking sadder and sadder the further they got away from the ice café. In the end, Botao stop the team from walking further away and redirected them to the ice café, hoping that his assumption was right. He could have asked, but he had feared that maybe Zekai would feel embarrassed to be called out – or that the other one would simply lie to not bother his teammates with his love for ice cream. Tonight was a bit different. Zhou Zekai expressed his desires – like the one for ice cream or the one for visiting the zoo – and didn't care about the fact that the zoo might be closed by now. He wanted to go, so he would go!

Some god must have heard Jiang Botao's silent prayer that his captain please refrained from going to the zoo – they needed to go back to the club and rest! When walking through a small park, they spotted a person lying on a bench. Both young men were worried and therefore approached the unknown person. Said person was a man around their age, as far as they could say considering the lacking light. Furthermore, that person seemed to be asleep. Who the hell would sleep outside at such a time? One would certainly freeze to death tonight!  
Carefully Jiang shook the person on the shoulder. Deep inside he hoped the other one would wake up and everything was fine, however despite his hopes he had already pulled out his phone to call an ambulance. Zhou Zekai was a nice guy and really wanted to help, but in such a situation he was quite useless with his inability to form informative sentences. However, maybe after this event the other one didn't want to go to see the penguins anymore. Hope dies last!  
Another god must have heard Jiang Botao's prayer that the men on the bench would wake up and be fine. Shortly before he decided to give up and call the ambulance the unknown man opened his eyes and tried to get up. His face looked a little bit too familiar.  
"Oh, good evening little Zhou, little Jiang. What are you two doing here?", the stranger asked.  
That's what they wanted to know from him!  
"Senior Ye?"  
It was surprisingly Zhou Zekai, who found his words first and responded to the man in front of them.  
"What are you doing here, Senior Ye?", Botao asked.  
"Oh, nothing much. Just a bit resting. It's already quite late, shouldn't you two head back to the club? Also you should disguise yourself better or else your fans will recognize you."  
Now that he pointed it out: How was he able to immediately recognize them? Was their disguise really that easy to look through?  
"Well, I will be going then. Thanks for waking me up."  
Without hesitation Ye Xiu stood up and wanted to walk away, however as soon as he stood on his feet he felt kind of dizzy. Maybe he wasn't fully awake yet?  
"Senior Ye be careful!", Botao cried out in panic, when he saw how unsteady Ye Xiu was.  
He immediately got up himself – he had kneeled down as he tried to wake the other one up –, to support Ye Xiu.  
"I'm fine. Just a bit sleepy. You two should head back too."  
"We will head back as soon as we helped you back to your hotel. In which hotel are you staying? Shall we call Su Mucheng? Your team must be worried about you."  
"No need, no need. I am fine. Believe me, I will find my way back. And don't bother yourself with the others. They won't worry about me", Ye Xiu answered.  
Ye Xiu was someone with manners, even when it wasn't always obvious, so when he talked with people he would look at them. However this time he refused to look at the two pro player.  
"Why is Senior here?", Zhou Zekai asked innocently, but his eyes spoke differently.  
Why was Ye Xiu here? Why was he still here?  
Yesterday had been a match day between Ye Xiu's team Excellent Era and Zhou Zekai's team Samsara – Excellent Era lost disgustingly. Today Excellent Era was supposed to return to Hangzhou – their home city –, but for whatever reason their captain was still in Shanghai. It was common practice for esport teams to give their players a day off after match day and start with training again on Monday. To fully utilize the day off some teams decided to return to their home city immediately after the match and interviews ended, while others decided to return in the early morning hours of the next day. This decision depended on many factors – sometimes a team would even decide to return in the evening of the next day, because they wanted to tour the city of their opponent. However, it was already night – Sunday would be over in a few hours, so why was Ye Xiu still here?

Awkwardly Ye Xiu rubbed his neck.  
"I overslept", he admitted.  
Yet his answerer sounded more like a question than anything. Therefore, Zhou Zekai and Jiang Botao both shot each other a glance before they sandwiched Ye Xiu – one on the right and one on the left – and dragged him along with them.  
"Senior Ye, how about you come with us for tonight. We will call Su Mucheng and tell her to pick you up. Wandering around this late is not safe!"  
There was no way in hell that Excellent Era would leave their captain, ace player and master tactician behind! Even less so would Su Mucheng! Something must have happen and this something wasn't as simple as oversleeping.  
Being dragged away wasn't a pleasing feeling, but there was nothing Ye Xiu could do against it. He wasn't completely helpless, still he stood no chance against Zhou Zekai and Jiang Botao, who both did excises unlike him. They were stronger, so in the end all he could do was verbally object to this treatment. Theoretically he could use their identities to cause them some trouble. Since Shanghai was team Samsara's home, they had many fans and even those, who weren't into Glory, at least knew their faces – it was hard not to know it, when Zhou Zekai's face was almost everywhere. One could say a lot about Ye Xiu and his sometimes questionable methods, but he wasn't that kind of jerk! They all needed their privacy – Ye Xiu hid away from the public's eye, but for the other pro players it would be easy to leak his appearance, yet none of them ever did something like this, so it would be quite mean and unreasonable to sell them out now.  
"Guys, I am an adult, I can take care of myself. You go back to your club and I go back to mine. There is nothing to worry about."  
His attempt to calm the other two down was for nothing. He was simply ignored.  
"Coat."  
"What?"  
"Captain means, you should close your coat. You will catch a cold, when you stay like this for longer", Jiang Botao explained.  
One of Ye Xiu's bad habits was to leave his coat open. Normally, he only went out for a smoke or buy some cigarettes. Around the club building of Excellent Era were many different shops, so he never had to walk far to get what he wanted or needed. Closing his coat was not really necessary.

Without hesitation Zekai closed Ye Xiu's coat.  
"Scarf?"  
"I don't have a scarf."  
While Jiang Botao and Zhou Zekai wore thick winter jackets, scarfs, gloves, wool caps and winter boots, Ye Xiu only had his coat, which he didn't even close, that could be considered winter clothing. Just looking at him made the other two shiver.  
"And I don't need one", Ye Xiu added slightly panicked, when he saw that Zekai was about to give up on his own scarf.  
"Alright, no scarf for Senior. However, we really need to get to a warmer place. Your hands are ice cold! As pro player you should know better than this! And we should call Su Mucheng. I am sure she is worried about you", Jiang Botao said.  
All he wanted was to get to the club as fast as possible. Luckily little Zhou had given up on his idea to go to the zoo and followed along obediently. Not so obediently did Ye Xiu followed along. It was obvious that he lacked the strength to push them away, but he could verbally object to their doing, which was ignored. Some people needed to be force to accept help – Ye Xiu was one of those people. Wasn't it kind of ironic that he preached teamwork in Glory, but had no sense of teamwork outside of the game? He almost never asked for help and he almost never told anyone about himself and his problems. Not really characteristics of a team player.  
It was a good thing that not too many people were around at the moment and those, who were, didn't mind the three men.

And with a constant complaining Ye Xiu, a silent Zhou Zekai and a soothing Jiang Botao, they reached their destination: the club building of team Samsara.  
It had to be said that neither Zhou Zekai nor Jiang Botao had thought this all through. Bringing Ye Xiu here and contact Su Mucheng sounded great, however, there was this little problem of Ye Xiu being a member of an opposing team. They couldn't just let him stay here, could they? What if he caught some valuable information that he could use against them in the next match? Their boss wouldn't allow Ye Xiu to stay, right? And they also couldn't just let Ye Xiu stay here without permission.  
Zhou Zekai seemingly didn't care about those things and brought Ye Xiu to his room. On their way it had become obvious with every passing second that Ye Xiu wasn't fine at all. His steps had become slower and slower. His complains quieter and quieter. He needed a rest. Now he could rest in Zekai's bed, which was so much softer, warmer and smelt better than a park bench – everything else would have been strange.  
Jiang Botao could be considered the brain of the operation, so he now had to deal with contacting Su Mucheng and explaining this to their boss, who wasn't in the club anymore. Most of the club employees didn't life inside the club building – it was mostly the pro players who lived here. Of those players, who lived here, only Jiang Botao and Zhou Zekai were still awake. Because of this, no one had come across their way to Zhou Zekai's room on the upper floor.  
"It's already late and the boss isn't here anymore. So, we should clear things tomorrow. As long as he doesn't wander around on his own, everything should be fine", Botao said to Zekai before leaving for his own room. He was tired and wanted nothing more than to sleep.  
Little Zhou on the other hand took care of Ye Xiu first. The other one needed to be brought to bed properly. Ye Xiu was already sick, so he needed to be taken care of correctly, so he would get better soon. For the night Zekai would sleep on the sofa or in one of the unused rooms.


End file.
